Are You Running Towards Something or Away From Something?

It took me years to realize I'd built two careers—first as an actor, then as a TV producer—on the wrong fuel. I wasn't chasing what I wanted. I was trying to outrun what I feared.

And there's a difference.

When you're running towards something—a vision, a purpose, something that genuinely lights you up—the hard work feels meaningful. You have difficult days, sure, but there's a reason. A direction. A why that keeps you going.

But when you're running away from something—fear of failure, fear of being seen as less than, fear of disappointing others—the finish line keeps moving. Because you're not chasing success. You're trying to escape a feeling.

And you can't outrun a feeling.

This is a pattern I often see. High achievers who've built entire careers on proving something.

Proving they're capable. Proving they're valuable. Proving they're not the person they're afraid of being.

The achievement is real. The skills are real. But the fuel? It's fear.

And fear-driven ambition has a shelf life.

You can run on it for years. Maybe decades. But at some point, your brain starts asking: "When is enough, enough? When do I get to stop proving myself?"

And if you don't have an answer, that's when things start to feel empty. When success stops feeling like success.

So how do you know which one you're doing? Ask yourself: if I achieved this goal, what would it give me? What would it mean?

If the answer is relief—relief from anxiety, from pressure, from the fear of not being good enough—that's a clue you're running away from something.

If the answer is fulfilment, growth, impact, contribution—something that pulls you forward rather than pushes you from behind—that's running towards something.

Neither is wrong. But one is sustainable (and sustaining). And one isn't.

The work I do with people isn't about lowering ambition. It's about redirecting it. About finding what genuinely matters to them, not what they think should matter or what will finally make them feel okay.

Because when you're running towards something that aligns with who you actually are, the energy changes. The work is still hard. But it's a different kind of hard. It's the kind that builds you up instead of wearing you down.

And here's what I wish I could tell my younger self: it wasn't the careers that were wrong. Acting and TV production could have been completely fulfilling if I'd understood what I was running towards instead of focusing on what I was running from. The work itself wasn't the problem. My relationship to it was.

So ask yourself: what am I running towards? And what am I running from?

Are You Running Towards Something or Away From Something?